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You can not visit Paris without visiting Le Tour Eiffel so we were up early to join the masses. Talk about queues! We got there at 8.50, it doesn't open until 9.30am, to be greeted by an impossibly long winding queue. Fortunately, the queue for the stairs was much shorter and so our exercise for the morning was to climb up to the second floor - not too hard in fact but we were all feeling a bit of vertigo by the time we got there. It was another crystal clear, sunny day so the views were amazing - all the way to la Defense and down to Le jardin des Tuilleries (I can never pronounce that), up to Sacre Coeur and past Montparnasse.
Sophie advised us to take the bus as it is much more scenic so from Le tour Eiffel we bused to Charles de Gaulle Etoile to visit the l'Arc de Triomphe and the unknown soldiers tomb. By then we were absolutely famished so baguette sandwiches for us all in a little street off Champs Élysées followed by a bit of shopping for the queen of shopping, our Sophie. There are a number of chain stores on the Champs Élysées so it wasn't as expensive as it could have been!
Another bus took us as far as Place de la Concorde from where we wandered through les Jardins des Tuilleries, had an ice cream and relaxed in the shade. It hasn't been as hot today thankfully, about 25 instead of yesterday's 35 degrees. Yesterday it really felt like an Indian summer with the heat followed by a thunder storm and a brief downpour in the morning - typical summer weather for Paris in July/August.
The number of people here is astounding! As Jonathan remarked you end up people watching instead of admiring all the beautiful buildings just because of the number of people walking past and distracting you. I must admit it is pleasant to be surrounded by people who look healthy (if not a bit too thin) the only overweight people here appear to be the foreigners, NZ definitely has an obesity problem.
The guys were so surprised to see the Louvre and Pyramides as we exited the Jardins through l'Arc de Napoleons. Brodie in particular loved the glass pyramids and insisted we go to the souvenir shop to buy yet another souvenir gold coin with its image embossed on it. He has been collecting them at every scenic landmark since London and has quite a collection now. Daddy is going to make him a display box when we get home.
We didn't visit inside the Louvre as we have tickets for La musee d'Orsay and La musee Picasso, smaller more manageable museums that the children will hopefully enjoy. Really, visiting Paris is like visiting one enormous museum!
By now, the children were getting a bit tired so we managed to squeeze in les Jardins du Palai Royal where we stumbled on a fashion wedding shoot, past la Comedie Francaise and onto yet another bus in the direction of home.
As we waited for the bus we could see Opera Garnier in the background and as I explained to the family behind that is Galleries Lafayette. I could so easily keep going, inspire of tired feet, but the children have reached their limit. They are doing so well with keeping up with the pace, learning French words, taking photos and just really interested in everything that's going on. Brodie in particular is coming out of his shell and his personality is starting to show through. So good to see after him having such a hard time at school this year.
We didn't quite make it back to the apartment as we made a detour to Le commissaries de police to report Jonathan's wallet being stolen. We discovered you can't just walk into a police station here you have to approach the two police at the grilled gate who are dressed in bullet proof jackets and armed to the teeth! In spite of this they were very friendly and helpful and we left with our necessary papers so Jonathan can drive here in France without his drivers licence.
Our friend Quitterie is working in Paris at the moment so she managed to escape work early and met up with us for dinner. As the children were so tired we popped into a little traiteur asiatique for their dinner and quitteriecameto our arrondissement instead of us going to Montmartre. It's a shame we didn't go there but hopefully we manage it another time. We found a cute we Moroccan restaurant near our apartment and had a fantastic meal there - my little taste of Morrocco until we get to travel there.
It was such a strange feeling seeing Quitterie for the first time as we both had the impression of catching up with a good friend but in fact it was the first time we had met in person as we have only ever skyped each other! Luckily, she speaks some English so Jonathan didn't fell left out this time.
Sleep in for everyone tomorrow and then we're off to Le Marais (Jewish quarter) as it is Sunday and it'll be nice and lively. The Marche aux puce will have to wait for another time there just isn't enough time to fit everything in, Dommage!
- comments
Brooke Wow amazing Mhairi, what fantastic weather too! Makes me miss France so much. Musee Picasso is quite cool, so is Musee Rodin if you get a chance. Rod is also enjoying your blog :-)
Granny and Grandpa Wow! You really are doing everything. Bon courage pour le future.